[Note: I'm at GodBlogCon thru the weekend so normal posting will resume on Monday.]
Why is Dan Rather not considered one of the wisest men in America?
Perhaps I should substitute intelligent or knowledgeable for wisest, though I suspect the reaction would be the same. The question appears random, even absurd. But consider: Last year Rather ended a 56 year career as a reporter and broadcaster. His career spanned from the assassination of JFK to the Iraq conflict. He covered eight U.S. presidents and hundreds of global leaders. He witnessed hundreds of conflicts, from Cold War battles abroad to Civil Rights struggles a home. A conservative estimate would be that he spent roughly 75,000 hours reporting, researching, or reading about current events.
So if that level of intimacy with the news does not make Rather notably more wise, intelligent, or knowledgeable, then what exactly is the benefit? And what do we expect to gain by spending an hour or two a day keeping up with the latest headlines?
Tell people that you rarely read blogs, listen to talk radio, or watch reality TV and they will make no general assumptions about your lack of intellect. Tell people you never watch TV news, rarely listen to radio news broadcasts, and only read newspapers on Sundays and the reaction will be markedly different. They will automatically peg you as a person who is ill-informed, out-of-touch, and possibly even anti-intellectual. The same people who would dismiss the notion that Dan Rather is an cosmopolitan intellect, will automatically assume that their forms of entertainment make them wiser, smarter, or at least better informed than you.
Why do so many people buy into the ridiculous notion that a daily diet of current events is anything other than a mindless (though perhaps harmless) form of amusement? Even ardent news-hounds will admit that the bulk of daily "news" is nothing more than trivia or gossip. How much of what happens every day truly is all that important? How many of us have ever even stopped to ask why we have daily news?
As University of Florida history professor C. John Sommerville notes in his excellent book, How the News Makes Us Dumb: The Death of Wisdom in an Information Age:
The product of the news business is change, not wisdom. Wisdom has to do with seeing things in their largest context, whereas news is structured in a way that destroys the larger context. You have to do certain things to information if you want to sell it on a daily basis. You have to make each day's report seem important. And you do that by reducing the importance of its context.
This focus on change has had a crippling effect on conservatism. Once we believed our mission as conservatives was to "stand athwart history yelling 'Stop.'" Change was something to be undertaken slowly and with reflection. After all, the important institutions--family, religion, government--shouldn't change on a whim. But now even conservatives are becoming more like liberals. We don't just ask what government has done for us lately; we ask what it has done for us today. We don't just ask for change when it is needed, we ask for it daily.
The late media critic Neil Postman once wrote that the media has given us the conjunction, "'Now, this...', which does not connect anything to anything but does the opposite: separates everything from everything."
'Now, this...' is commonly used on radio and television newscasts to indicate that what one has just heard or seen has no relevance to what one is about to hear or see, or possibly to anything one is ever likely to hear or see. The phrase is a means of acknowledging the fact that the world as mapped by the speeded-up electronic media has no order or meaning and is not to be taken seriously. There is no murder so brutal, no earthquake so devastating, no political blunder so costly - for that matter, no ball score so tantalizing or weather report so threatening - that it cannot be erased from our minds by a newscaster saying, "Now ... this."
As a Christian, I'm expected to reject this "Now, this..." mindset in favor of an eternal perspective, viewing events not just in their historical but in their eschatological context. But I can't do that if my attention is focused on the churning detritus of the 24 hour news cycle. Besides, events that are truly important are rarely those captured on the front page of a daily paper.
As Malcolm Muggeridge, himself a journalist, admitted, "I've often thought that if I'd been a journalist in the Holy Land at the time of our Lord's ministry, I should have spent my time looking into what was happening in Herod's court. I'd be wanting to sign Salome for her exclusive memoirs, and finding out what Pilate was up to, and--I would have missed completely the most important event there ever was."
Indeed, imagine if Dan Rather had been a reporter during that era: "...three revolutionaries were crucified on Golgatha today. Included among the executions was a man called Jesus, who some Jews considered to be the messiah. Those hopes were dashed, however, around three P.M. when Roman soldiers declared Jesus dead. And now, this...
For several weeks CNN has been hyping their upcoming miniseries God's Warriors as an "unprecedented six-hour television event." The series, which begun last night, dedicates two hours each to "God's Jewish Warriors", "God's Muslim Warriors", and "God's Christian Warriors." Prior to the first airing, CNN invited several bloggers to preview a few clips from the series and to submit a question for their chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour to be answered during a special webcast.
The three clips provided by CNN each highlighted one of the "fundamentalist" branches of the three Abrahamic faiths:
(Can you guess what CNN thinks that these three groups have in common?)
I asked Amanpour if the juxtaposition could be viewed as guilt by association, equating Falwell with religious fanatics who are driven to murder. Her response:
All right. You know, he has a – he has a point. I don’t know how those individual clips were chosen and put out, but all I ask is that people look at the totality of each two-hour documentary, because clearly there’s going to be the spectrum from the violent to the legitimate.
I would say that we’re trying not to focus just on violence, because we feel that has been done over and over again in legitimate daily news coverage and many documentaries before. What we’re trying to show is the way religion is experiencing a real surge as a political tool and as a political outlet, and how religion is impacting our cultures in the Islamic, Jewish, and Christian worlds.
Later on she reiterated that the producers had no intention of creating a "moral equivalency" least of all "in the tactics used." Fair enough. So she doesn't think that the kids at Liberty are equivalent to suicide bombers and political assassins.
While the producers of the series are not attempting to establish a moral equivalency, they are establishing an equivalency of ideology. According to their narrative, Falwell, the "religious right", and other conservative Christians, may not be violent, but like the fundamentalist Jews and Muslims, they are attempting to circumvent the inviolable status of secularism.
Indeed, this seems to be what Amanpour believes: "[I]n the Western and in the developed world, perhaps here in the 21st century we would have expected secularism and governance and politics to be what governs our daily lives," Amanpour told the bloggers. "We would not have expected, and perhaps we still don’t expect, religion to play such a real, present role in our daily lives, politics, and culture."
Aside from unreconstructed Marxists, pollyannish Secular Humanists, and pessimists that thought the future would resemble a George Orwell novel, who really ever expected our daily lives to be governed by "secularism and governance and politics?"
Amanpour's surprise and dismay encapsulates the difference in perspective between people who believe that their faith informs all of life—including politics and culture—and those who believe religion should be kept secularly locked within in the walls of the church, synagogue, or mosque.
Why is Dan Rather not considered one of the wisest men in America?
Perhaps I should substitute “intelligent” or “knowledgeable” for “wisest”, though I suspect the reaction would be the same. The question appears random, even absurd. But consider: Last week Rather announced he was leaving CBS News, ending a 56 year career as a reporter and broadcaster. His career spanned from the assassination of JFK to the Iraq conflict. He covered eight U.S. presidents and hundreds of global leaders. He witnessed hundreds of conflicts, from Cold War battles abroad to Civil Rights struggles a home. A conservative estimate would be that he spent roughly 75,000 hours reporting, researching, or reading about current events.
So if that level of intimacy with the news does not make Rather notably more wise, intelligent, or knowledgeable, then what exactly is the benefit? And what do we expect to gain by spending an hour or two a day keeping up with the latest headlines?
Tell people that you rarely read blogs, listen to talk radio, or watch reality TV and they will make no general assumptions about your lack of intellect. Tell people you never watch TV news (“I prefer reruns of Seinfeld.”), rarely listen to radio news broadcasts (“I’m usually listening to an audiobooks instead…”), and only read newspapers on Sundays (“…mainly for the comics and book reviews…”) and the reaction will be quite different. They will automatically peg you as a person who is ill-informed, out-of-touch, and possibly even anti-intellectual. The same people who would dismiss the notion that Dan Rather is an cosmopolitan intellect, will automatically assume that their forms of entertainment make them wiser, smarter, or at least “better informed” than you.
Why do so many people buy into the ridiculous notion that a daily diet of “current events’ is anything other than a mindless (though perhaps harmless) form of amusement? Even ardent news-hounds will admit that the bulk of daily “news” is nothing more than trivia or gossip. How much of what happens every day truly is all that important? How many of us have ever even stopped to ask why we have daily news?
As University of Florida history professor C. John Sommerville notes in his excellent book, How the News Makes Us Dumb: The Death of Wisdom in an Information Age:
The product of the news business is change, not wisdom. Wisdom has to do with seeing things in their largest context, whereas news is structured in a way that destroys the larger context. You have to do certain things to information if you want to sell it on a daily basis. You have to make each day’s report seem important. And you do that by reducing the importance of its context.
This focus on change has had a crippling effect on conservatism. Once we believed our mission as conservatives was to "stand athwart history yelling 'Stop.'" Change was something to be undertaken slowly and with reflection. After all, the important institutions – family, religion, government – shouldn’t change on a whim. But now even conservatives are becoming more like liberals. We don’t just ask what government has done for us lately; we ask what it has done for us today. We don’t just ask for change when it is needed, we ask for it daily.
The late media critic Neil Postman once wrote that the media has given us the conjunction, “Now…this”, which “does not connect anything to anything but does the opposite: separates everything from everything.”
“Now…this” is commonly used on radio and television newscasts to indicate that what one has just heard or seen has no relevance to what one is about to hear or see, or possibly to anything one is ever likely to hear or see. The phrase is a means of acknowledging the fact that the world as mapped by the speeded-up electronic media has no order or meaning and is not to be taken seriously. There is no murder so brutal, no earthquake so devastating, no political blunder so costly - for that matter, no ball score so tantalizing or weather report so threatening - that it cannot be erased from our minds by a newscaster saying, "Now ... this."
As a Christian, I’m expected to reject this “Now…this” mindset in favor of an eternal perspective, viewing events not just in their historical but in their eschatological context. But I can’t do that if my attention is focused on the churning detritus of the 24 hour news cycle. Besides, events that are truly important are rarely those captured on the front page of a daily paper.
As Malcolm Muggeridge, himself a journalist, admitted, “I’ve often thought…that if I’d been a journalist in the Holy Land at the time of our Lord’s ministry, I should have spent my time looking into what was happening in Herod’s court. I’d be wanting to sign Salome for her exclusive memoirs, and finding out what Pilate was up to, and…I would have missed completely the most important event there ever was.”
Indeed, imagine if Dan Rather had been a reporter during that era: “…three revolutionaries were crucified on Golgatha today. Included among the executions was a man called Jesus, who some Jews considered to be the messiah. Those hopes were dashed, however, around three P.M. when Roman soldiers declared Jesus dead. And now…this….”
(HT: Prosthesis)
[Note: This post, the first in an occasional series on popular cultural trends, examines the use of sexual imagery in advertising. While it contains no overtly explicit material, some readers might find the subject matter offensive.]
Times are tough for advertising executives. The old rules haven’t changed but applying them in creative ways has become exceedingly more difficult. Take, for example, the old truism that “sex sells.” How do you apply that axiom in a culture that is literally saturated in sexual imagery? When sex is the background noise, it is nearly impossible to use it to be heard. Even pushing the boundaries has become a futile exercise when what was once taboo has become banal, passé, and trite.
“Advertisers have gone too far,” says culture critic Chuck Klosterman, “and I don’t mean too far as in “too extreme” or “too sexual” or “too dangerous.” What I mean is that they have taken their logic too far.
Advertisers are no longer selling an idealized version of existence; they are actually trying to sell a lifestyle that consumers haven’t even considered as a remote possibility. Suggesting that drinking a certain kind of vodka will increase a person’s likelihood of having sex with two women simultaneously is almost like suggesting that drinking a certain kind of gin will make him invisible. It’s more than just implausible; it’s basically inconceivable.
Inconceivable though it may be, there has been a marked trend in advertising that attempts to use the allure of multiple sexual partners to sell products. Polyamoury has become a recurring them in print and media advertising. Having reached the limits (for now) of exposed flesh in sexual imagery, advertisers are forced to stretch the laws of logic by increasing the number of sexual partners. The following photos are representative of the trend that can be found on billboards, in magazines, and even on the sides of public busses. While the sample size is small (12 ads for 3 products), it should be sufficient to draw your attention to the trend. Once you see the pattern, you'll begin to notice just how prevalent it has become.
[NOTE OF CAUTION: While all of these ads can be found in general readership magazines, the images may not be work-safe.]
(Click on photo to enlarge.)
There's just something about Charles Manson that women find irresistible.
Ménage a necrophilia?
This ad, aimed at Indian audiences, plays off of Hindu festival that last for ten days (hence the ten available women). One of the time-honored beliefs of Dassera day is that any new venture started on this day is bound to be successful. Care to guess what “new venture” the young man in the ad is hoping to undertake?
Using an image of a Conquistator (conqueror) adds a twist of sexual slavery to an otherwise dull ad.
The clever use of context implies that using Axe will make a man attractive to both sexes.
An overtly phallic image with one man and several (between 3 and 5) women.
What woman can resist sharing a shower with one man and nine other women?
By using Axe, even a troll can enjoy polyamoury.
Seven identical "Snow Whites?" Well, aren't all women basically interchangeble?
It’s hard to determine what is creepier – that a condom company would use children’s toys in their ads or that the male doll look like Chris Gaines.
Three guys laying around, heads at crotch level, holding their … bottles of vodka. Nothing weird going on here…
Everyone in this picture – from the waiter holding the tray to the gaggle of arms and legs – looks like they must be terribly uncomfortable.
The advertisers of these products are not only selling an idea that is "basically inconceivable", they are also pushing a concept that most people -- even men -- truly wouldn't want. Those who think otherwise should remember the immortal words spoken by Jerry Seinfeld when faced with a similar polyamourous opportunity:
"Don't you know what it means to become an orgy guy? It changes everything. I'd have to dress different. I'd have to act different. I'd have to grow a moustache and get all kinds of robes and lotions and I'd need a new bedspread and new curtains I'd have to get thick carpeting and weirdo lighting. I'd have to get new friends. I'd have to get orgy friends. ... Naw, I'm not ready for it."
How long will it take those pushing these polyamorous ads to come to the same conclusion and realize that the public simply isn't ready for it?
[Note: This is post #5 in the Blogiversary II series.]
Now that the two media behemoths Clear Channel and Infinity Broadcasting own every FCC license in the Western Hemisphere, commercial radio has consolidated into one monolithic blanket of banality. Even those of us who are fortunate enough to live in a major radio market (I live in Dallas/Ft.Worth) have few real choices on our radio dials.*
Pop and country stations used to play the “top 40” but now they repeat the same singles over and over throughout the day. No matter when I tune in I know I'll hear about Usher’s confessions or how Toby Keith loves his bar. The music from both genres has become so monotonous that I’m starting to get them mixed up in my head. Just the other day I imagined that Nelly and Tim McGraw were singing a duet.
There is also the “alternative” station in town which has a heavy rotation of Nickelback and Green Day. Apparently, the term “alternative” is loosely defined as to mean any alternative to Usher and Toby Keith. We do have a true alternative at the university, but like every campus radio station the signal can’t reach past the beer-soaked lawns on fraternity row.
We also have an “urban” channel that plays hardcore rap in case you need a soundtrack for a drive-by shooting and a “smooth jazz” station that will make you want to reach for your gat and bust a cap in somebody. There is one exceptional “classic soul” channel that is worthy of praise. Unfortunately, during the morning drive-time the music is replaced by Tom Joyner and company giggling for five seconds before going to the next commercial. And of course you have the requisite “Christian” station playing sugary music so vapid and mawkish that the playlist must be programmed by Satan himself.
Fortunately, I still have another option available. There’s a place on my radio dial that I can turn to hear news, current events, intelligent conversation, and the latest on politics and culture; an oasis amidst the desert of the airwaves. And no, it’s not talk radio. It’s better. It’s NPR.
Here’s six reasons why National Public Radio beats talk radio:
It’s not part of the conservative monoculture – Here in the Metroplex I have three different AM talk stations to choose from. During the day I can listen to Mark Davis, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Gary McNamara, Darrell Ankarlo, Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, Greg Knapp, Tony Snow, Laura Ingraham, Dennis Prager, Michael Medved, and Michael Savage.* Every single host is a middle-aged white male conservative (except for Ingraham, who merely imitates being one).
Naturally, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that perspective. But why would I want to listen to the same viewpoint being expressed ad nauseum? Seriously, if I want to know what a white male conservative thinks I can just read my own blog.
*There is also Bill Bennett (8am-11am) and Hugh Hewitt (8pm-11pm) but I can’t pick up either one of those shows on my car stereo.
There are no callers – On her recent appearance on Sean Hannity’s radio show, Jeanne Garofalo refused to talk to callers. She claimed that when people call in to radio shows it does nothing but bore the audience. For once, Jeanne and I agree. The people who call radio shows rarely have anything interesting to say. Mostly they simply want to express that they either love the show’s host or tell them that they disagree with him (and it’s almost always a him). The opinions expressed by callers are consistently unoriginal and dull. Only on the most rare occasion do the add anything worthwhile to the conversation.
But radio hosts love them because they fill airtime. Because the supply always exceeds the demand, a national radio host can fill any excess time by simply answering the phones. Even the most obscure topic will keep people waiting on the line for hours just so that they can hear themselves talk.
NPR shows, on the other hand, rarely have callers. Instead they fill the spare airtime with actual content.
No commercials – I realize that radio is a business and that stations have to sell commercials to stay on the air. But do they need to have so many? Most shows have news and traffic at the top and bottom of each hour. That’s two breaks, along with local commercials. Then they run ads about every 5-7 minutes. All together, the show is interrupted about ten times every hour. Chance are that when you get into your car and turn on radio the AM station will either be playing an ad or will be going to commercial within thirty seconds. Add these breaks to the time wasted on callers and you end up with very little actual content.
No Dittoheads – In all of the years I’ve listened to NPR, I’ve never heard anyone praise Terry Gross or Bob Edwards. Yet you can’t listen to talk radio for more than five minutes without hearing a caller sucking up to the host. I’m sure it is very gratifying to hear people constantly sing your praises but it's annoying for the listener.
And while I’m sure that Sean Hannity is a decent guy and good citizen, it’s rather disturbing hearing him constantly referred to as a “Great Man.” Smedley Butler, a Marine who won two Medals of Honor, was a great man. George Washington, the man who helped win the American Revolution, was a great man. Abraham Lincoln, a President who held the country together during the Civil War, was a great man. Sean Hannity is a talk show host. He makes his living talking. All day. That doesn’t quite qualify him for Great Man status.
It's not Rush – Let’s admit the truth: Rush’s glory days have long since passed him by. Fifteen years ago his schtick was still somewhat fresh and daring. Yes, he was egotistical and overbearing but it was all for show; a way to get under the skin of liberals. But now it’s simply become tiresome. Anyone who still listens to Rush drone on for three hours (or fifteen minutes once you cut out the commercials) is likely doing so out of nostalgia.
Rush was a pioneer and there is no doubt that if it weren’t for him conservative talk radio wouldn’t be the force it is today. But, ironically, his success has led to his downfall. Nowadays he’s being upstaged by imitators like Sean Hannity who do a better job of playing “Rush” than Limbaugh does. It’s time for Mr. Snerdley to whisper in the big guy’s headphones and tell him to put away the Golden Microphone.
There's no Dr. Laura – Say what you will about NPR, it has no one as annoying as Dr. Laura. Listening to her tell people how they could fix their lives is like being trapped in a small room with your mother-in-law.
In comparison, the flaws of talk radio allow NPR to stand out more than is warranted. Listening to NPR is like dating a charming and beautiful woman that has a semi-serious personality disorder; you're enchanted by her yet know you can’t commit to someone so troubled. But most criticism of the station is too simplistic, too concerned with its liberal bias. The problem with the station, though, runs much deeper than a mere penchant for left-leaning politics. NPR can be heard in almost every town in the country yet its worldview is a secular cosmopolitanism that is foreign to many Americans, particularly those in non-urban areas or in the “Red States.” The hosts of All Things Considered, for example, would have no trouble relating to an obscure avant garde musician, while a popular gospel singer would be considered an anthropological curiosity.
Still, NPR takes ideas, culture, art, and international affairs seriously. Conservative talk radio may touch on the same issues but generally they are either treated defensively (“In our next segment, the NEA's plan to ruin our children…”) or as purely political concerns (“Will the genocide in Darfur hurt Kofi Annan?”). Talk radio is merely topical while NPR attempts to be timely.
Mostly when I listen to NPR I wonder why conservatives can’t produce something similar. Why can’t we have discussions about art for art’s sake on the radio? Why can’t we have debates about the role of religion without it being subordinated to politics? Why have we ceded all culture to the “liberals?”
The other day I heard a segment on NPR by a young medical student at Harvard. He was describing a scene in which a pediatrician convinced a child to endure the pain of a vaccination by invoking “magic dust.” From this launching point he raised questions about the ethics of the placebo effect and the trust we put in physicians. It didn’t produce any earth-shaking epiphanies but it did make me ponder the questions involved. Like the best blog posts, it helped me to think about an issue that wasn’t imperative but was still important.
The short segment reminded me of what radio could be, but rarely becomes. Too often talk radio simply asks us to choose sides. Issues aren’t debated in order to change minds, for our minds are already made up. We are only asked to agree or disagree with the host. I, for one, don’t want my time wasted on such trivial discussions. I want to be challenged, I want a real, honest debate. Maybe Rush is right about everything. But I’d still prefer to think for myself.
*I originally wrote this post in November 2004 and have since moved to the Chicago area. Now I have XM Sattelite Radio and a subscription to Mars Hill Audio Journal so I don't listen to as much talk radio -- or NPR -- as I once did.
How is it possible for a man whose opinion no one values to make a comment on a cable television show that no one watches and have it turn into a topic that no one can stop talking about? Because we have all become insatiable consumers of the media and when there is no news to report, the new product must be, as late historian Daniel Boorstin explained, created:
Then came round-the-clock media. The news gap soon became so narrow that in order to have additional "news" for each new edition or each new broadcast it was necessary to plan in advance the stages by which any available news would be unveiled. After the weekly and the daily came the "extras" and the numerous regular editions. The Philadelphia Evening Bulletin soon had seven editions a day. No rest for the newsman. With more space to fill, he had to fill it ever more quickly. In order to justify the numerous editions, it was increasingly necessary that the news constantly change or at least seem to change. With radio on the air continuously during waking hours, the reporters' problems became still more acute. News every hour on the hour, and sometimes on the half hour. Programs interrupted any time for special bulletins. How to avoid deadly repetition, the appearance that nothing was happening, that news gatherers were asleep, or that competitors were more alert? As the costs of printing and then of broadcasting increased, it became financially necessary to keep the presses always at work and the TV screen always busy. Pressures toward the making of pseudo-events became ever stronger. News gathering turned into news making.
If you find Boorstin’s observation rather banal and obvious, keep in mind that he wrote this statement in 1961.
Over the past 44 years, the news cycle has accelerated to a breakneck speed. Not only do we have 24-hour news channels but we have Google News, RSS feeds, and blogs to provide us with up to the minute coverage of the most trivial non-events. Take, for example, Pat Robertson’s comment which was reported by CNN on Wednesday, August 24 at 1:34 a.m. EDT.
Robert from brightMystery posted a link to the story at 8:19 a.m. on Thursday and was disappointed that at 11:43 a.m. – three and half hour later – he was unable to find “links to statements by prominent evangelicals denouncing these remarks.”*
Staying abreast of relevant current events is no longer sufficient; to be truly informed of what is going on in the world, one is also expected to have the freshest information on breaking non-events. If you are a blogger you can add to this the expectation to have an opinion/denunciation/apology posted in case someone might be unsure of where you stand on a matter of complete unimportance. Several bloggers feigned surprise and disappointment that Christian bloggers (like me) did not denounce Robertson’s remark. In the age of instant media, it is not enough to simply be our brother’s keeper. Now, we must also be their press agent.
As a Christian, though, I’m expected to take an eternal perspective, viewing events not just in their historical but in their eschatological context. But I can’t do that while focusing on the churning events in the last 24 hours and furiously scripting my reactions to insignificant minutiae. Events that are truly important are often those that are not captured on the front page of a daily paper or on Instapundit. As Malcolm Muggeridge, himself a journalist, admitted, “I’ve often thought…that if I’d been a journalist in the Holy Land at the time of our Lord’s ministry, I should have spent my time looking into what was happening in Herod’s court. I’d be wanting to sign Salome for her exclusive memoirs, and finding out what Pilate was up to, and…I would have missed completely the most important event there ever was.”
* I don’t mean to pick on Robert by using him as an example. Because many Christians call on Muslims to denouce outrageous remarks made by Islamofacists, he was merely expecting evangelicals to be consistent and do the same.
Note: The last paragraph was originally written for a post titled, The New, New, News: How the News Makes Us Dumb.
Last Wednesday the Boston Globe ran a story about a seasonal hunt for baby seals off Newfoundland, Canada. The article described in graphic detail how the seal hunt began on Tuesday, with water turning red as hunters on some 300 boats shot harp seal cubs "by the hundreds." Canadians complained to the Globe that the story contained a significant error: the hunt never happened. Inclement weather had caused the event to be postponed for later in the week; two days after the story ran in the paper.
The seal hunt is the latest case of reporter taking poetic license by adding details that are “fake, but accurate.” One of the most egregious examples is the Slate article which described a "monkeyfishing" excursion in the Florida Keys. The expedition supposedly involved taking a boat to an island occupied by monkeys and casting for them like fish, using fruit for bait. Editors at Slate initially stood by the story until they realized that they too had been duped by a journalist eager to craft an interesting tale.
Slate and the Boston Globe aren’t the only ones with red-faced editors. Several other journalists, as Michelle Malkin notes, have been caught “monkeyfishing.” But not everyone believes this leads to a crisis of credibility. Kevin T. Keith claims, for example, that Malkin’s list is rather paltry:
15 examples - a good number of which are meaningless - from 10 major newspapers, broadcast networks, and wire services, over 25 years. Sounds to me like the “biased, old-model mainstream media” are doing pretty well.
So is the mainstream media’s credibility cup half-full or half-empty? The answer lies not with the media but with the individual news “consumer.” As Richard Whatley, an Oxford scholar and Anglican Archbishop of Dublin, wrote in 1819:
It is rather a remarkable circumstance that it is common to hear Englishmen speak of the impudent fabrications of foreign newspapers, and express wonder that any one can be found to credit them; while they conceive that, in this favored land, the liberty of the press is a sufficient security for veracity.
It is true they often speak contemptuously of such "newspaper stories" as last but a short time; indeed, they continually see them contradicted within a day or two in the same paper, or their falsity detected by some journal of an opposite party; but still whatever is long adhered to and often repeated, especially if it also appear in several different papers (and this, though they notoriously copy from one another), is almost sure to be generally believed.
Whence this high respect which is practically paid to newspaper authority? Do men think that because a witness has been perpetually detected in falsehood, he may therefore be the more safely believed whenever he is not detected? or does adherence to a story, and frequent repetition of it, render it the more credible? On the contrary, is it not a common remark in other cases, that a liar will generally stand to and reiterate what he has once said, merely because he has said it?
Whatley uses the following as an example of what the philosopher David Hume claimed was “the readiness with which men believe, on very slight evidence, any story that pleases their imagination by its admirable and marvelous character.”
1. An obscure adventurer advances rapidly through the ranks of the French army, obtains a high command, and gains a series of important victories.
2. He embarks on an unsuccessful expedition against Egypt. He then leaves the army and returns to France where he overthrows the existing government and makes himself the supreme power.
3. He then goes on to face a powerful coalition of European States.
4. He is routed by the British navy and overrun on nearly the whole continent of Europe.
5. He eventually triumphs, enters the capitals of each country, and installs his own kings. He controls the areas from Spain to Russia.
6. Upon reaching Moscow he is stopped by a severe winter and his army is routed.
7. He raises another army which is also subsequently ruined.
8. He raises yet another army and, once again, is routed.
9. He is deposed and exiled to a small island.
10. Nine months later, with the help of 600 men, he attempts to depose the French king.
He is reinstated without struggle.
11. He raises (yet another) army and is completely defeated in a single battle.
12. He is deposed again and sent to a different island where he remains until his death.
Based on nothing more than hearsay evidence provided by newspapers, Whatley noted, people throughout Europe believed in the existence and exploits of Napoleon Bonaparte.
But did Whatley’s countrymen have reason to believe in Napoleon, a man who was claimed to be currently serving as a prisoner on the island of St. Helena?
Let us, if possible, divest ourselves of this superstitious veneration for everything that appears "in print," and examine a little more systematically the evidence which is adduced.
I suppose it will not be denied, that the three following are among the most important points to be ascertained in deciding on the credibility of witnesses -- first, whether they have the means of gaining correct information; secondly, whether they have any interest in concealing truth, or propagating falsehood; and, thirdly, whether they agree in their testimony.
On all three points, the credibility of the press was insufficient to provide a reason for believing that Napoleon existed, much less performed the extraordinary feats that were associated with his name. Believing that these exploits occurred and that such an incredible man walked the earth was based not on the credibility of the press but on a criterion of credulity. In other words, people often form beliefs based on testimony not because of the integrity of the observer but because it fits their conception of what is possible or even likely to have occurred.
The purpose of this lengthy examination, therefore, is not to determine whether the mainstream media should or should not be considered trustworthy. The more revealing point is that whether or not the media is trustworthy rarely factors into decision to trust the “news.” Instead we filter claims made by the media through our own presuppositions and worldview. The media, of course, are also human and go through the same process. That is why claims of “bias” are often levied against those whose worldview differs from our own.
Beliefs are formed based on our intrinsic biases and presuppositions. In order to even form a belief we must first entertain the notion that it is believable. Whether a person trusts news stories about monkeys “flying from the trees, a juicy apple stapled to its palm” or tales of a Palestinian Jew who turns water into wine has less to do with who we find credible than with what we consider conceivable.
Constantly in search of a sensational story, the American newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst once sent a telegram to a leading astronomer that read: "Is there life on Mars? Please cable 1000 words." The scientist responded "Nobody knows" -- repeated 500 times.
Most days we bloggers are like Hearst, always looking for material to fill empty space (and often we are like the astronomer, repeating what we have to say to the point of absurdity). Today, for example, I spent several hours reading about Ward Churchill’s gaffe, Dan Rather’s retirement, Michael Jackson’s trial and other “news” of absolutely no consequence. Instead of adding to the cacophony I’ve decided to repost a previous article I wrote as a reminder (mostly for myself) of how “dailiness” can become a disease.
“I have a confession,” wrote law professor Steve Bainbridge a few months ago, “I support President Bush, but I don't especially like him.” Steve, a first-rate thinker and one of my favorite bloggers, listed as one of his reasons for his disklike Bush’s “smug anti-intellectualism.” “How can you be proud of not reading the newspaper?” Steve asked.
Well, I have a confession too. I don’t read newspapers either. And like Bush, I’m rather proud of that fact.
It’s not just newspapers, though. I never watch TV news (I prefer reruns of Seinfeld), rarely listen to radio news broadcasts (I’m usually listening to an audiobook), and only read newspapers on Sundays (mainly for the comics and book reviews). Though my buddy Steve may think it’s a form of anti-intellectualism, I think it’s just the opposite. In my opinion, the “news” makes us dumb.
Before you disagree, ask yourself this two-part question about any news article: what makes this story important and what distinguishes it from mere gossip and/or trivia?
One aspect of any answer would have to include an explanation of how how the story either fits into a broader narrative or has an inherent permanence. But how often does that apply to our daily news? How much of what happens every day truly is all that important? How many of us have ever even stopped to ask why we have daily news?
University of Florida history professor C. John Sommerville is one brave soul who has dared ask that question. In reviewing Sommerville’s book How the News Makes Us Dumb: The Death of Wisdom in an Information Age, Stuart Buck writes (for Boundless webzine):
Why is dailiness a problem? Sommerville offers several reasons. First, the daily nature of the news (which means that publishers have to sell their product on a daily basis) encourages journalists to create a sense of crisis or tragedy. One example, of course, is the death of JFK, Jr. For the first couple of days after his plane was reported missing, no one could offer anything more than speculation about Kennedy's fate. Nevertheless, the TV news channels carried a steady stream of updates with headline like, "Breaking News on the Kennedy Tragedy." Of course, given the death rate in our country, there were likely a few thousand deaths that same day, and the Kennedy death was no more important in the grand scheme of things than any of the others. But because of the news industry's continuous operation, the journalists had to have something to sell – and nothing sells like a story that can be deemed a "tragedy."
Another problem with dailiness is that it discourages the placement of issues and events into a larger or deeper context. "The very survival of the news business depends on our seeing life as jumpy and scattered," says Sommerville, rather than as falling into a historical pattern or embodying some philosophical outlook. The constant need to find new events to talk about tends to displace any serious attempt to discuss the historical and philosophical implications of such events.
Anyone who doubts this should go back and read newspaper articles from Ronald Reagan’s presidency and compare them to the recent remarks made after his death. You won’t find too many clues that the world was getting safer or changing for the better. Instead, you’ll likely find the news stories that, in retrospect, appear remarkably inconsequential. Yet at the time they were considered “headline worthy.” (If you’ve ever read the newspaper from the day you were born you’ve probably had a similar letdown, realizing that nothing really important happened that day.)
The reason for this is rather obvious. As Sommerville points out:
The product of the news business is change, not wisdom. Wisdom has to do with seeing things in their largest context, whereas news is structured in a way that destroys the larger context. You have to do certain things to information if you want to sell it on a daily basis. You have to make each day’s report seem important. And you do that by reducing the importance of its context.
This focus on change also has had the affect of crippling conservatism. Once we believed our mission as conservatives was to "stand athwart history yelling 'Stop.'" Change was something to be undertaken slowly and with reflection. After all, the important institutions – family, religion, government – shouldn’t change on a whim. But now even conservatives are becoming more like liberals. We don’t just ask what government has done for us lately, we ask what it has done for us today. We don’t just ask for change when it is needed, we ask for it daily. We are addicted to the process of change.
What is most disconcerting is that we have come to believe that this addiction is normal and that those who aren’t hooked into a daily news feed are “ill-informed.” Take, for example, Steve Outing’s article on “The Blog-Only News Diet” which he describes as “experiment in mainstream-media deprivation.”*
Outing documents how Steve Rubel, a blogger an PR rep, conducted a news experiment in which he gave up his regular media habits and learned what was going on in the world solely by checking weblogs. Rubel claims that he “definitely lacked the depth of knowledge of current events gained in a normal week. ‘I felt a little naked,’ he says, having received the basics of the week's news from blogs, but not getting the real meat.”
What was this “real meat” he was missing out on? Outing gave him a quiz,
While knowing why President Bush hired a criminal lawyer last week, and the official reasons cited for George Tenet's resignation from the CIA, Rubel missed actor Daniel Radcliffe's statement that he thinks his Harry Potter character will die at the end of the J.K. Rowling book series. He didn't catch ex-Beatle Paul McCartney's admission that he tried heroin and was a cocaine user. And he missed more obscure stories, such as one of Seattle's famed monorail trains catching fire.
What is ironic is how completely “un-newsworthy” these items appear now, just a few weeks later. Since most of these stories would have fallen into the “trivia and gossip” category anyway, did Rubel really miss out on anything important? The reason he didn’t read about them on anyone’s blog is because most people wouldn’t have considered them “blog-worthy.” (I know that I personally tend to be attracted to stories that I can either add to a larger narrative or that have a broad “human interest” appeal (i.e., gossip).)
As a Christian, I’m expected to take an eternal perspective, viewing events not just in their historical but in their eschatological context. But I can’t do that while focusing on the churning events in the last 24 hours. Events that are truly important are rarely those captured on the front page of a daily paper. As Malcolm Muggeridge, himself a journalist, admitted, “I’ve often thought…that if I’d been a journalist in the Holy Land at the time of our Lord’s ministry, I should have spent my time looking into what was happening in Herod’s court. I’d be wanting to sign Salome for her exclusive memoirs, and finding out what Pilate was up to, and…I would have missed completely the most important event there ever was.”
After reading Hugh Hewitt’s announcement for the first GodBlogCon ("Let the news ring out throughout the Christian Blogosphere! The first ever Christian Blogosphere Convention is on."), media critic and blogger Jeff Jarvis wrote:
Well, I am a Christian. But I don't think I'll go. I'm a Howard-Stern-loving, gay-marriage-backing, prochoice, Clinton-voting, separation-of-church-and-state, cabernet-guzzling Christian. Something tells me that I'd fit in there about as well as I apparently would at the Kos Konvention.
If the differences were theological, I could better understand why Jarvis feels he wouldn’t fit in. But as is clearly noted, the convention is open to all Protestant, Orthodox, and Roman Catholic bloggers who adhere to historical biblical faith and Christian creeds and is “not centered in one brand of politics of political party.” While I personally don’t understand how a person resolves being “Howard-Stern-loving, gay-marriage-backing, [and] prochoice” with being a Christian, the convention is not about policy disagreements. It’s about community.
Disagreements on deeply held political matters are trivial compared to what we share – or at least what we should share -- in common. And whether a Christian is a teetotaler or a cabernet-guzzler is of absolutely no importance. What does matter is that we share a common Master: “By this all men will know that you are my disciples,” said Christ, “if you have love for one another."
Perhaps Jarvis would feel more at home at a convention of wine bloggers or Howard Stern blogfans. There is, of course, nothing wrong with wanting to spend time with people you share a common interest. But if he doesn’t feel that he would fit in with his fellow Christians here on earth, what will he do when he has to share space with us in heaven? After all, eternity is a long time to spend around James-Dobson-loving, gay-marriage-opposing, pro-life, Bush-voting, church-and-state-in-their-proper-sphere-advocating, merlot-sipping Christians.
Although I wrote a brief post on the Gannon/Guckert scandal soon after the story broke, I had no intention of commenting on it any further. But over the past weekend I’ve received dozens of emails asking why I have ignored this non-story. The responses come from “Christians” who are outraged that a “gay hustler” was able to speak to the President of the United States and from liberals who feel that I am ignoring the greatest cover-up in Presidential history. While I’m flattered that these readers care so much about my opinion, I don’t share their view that this story is imporant.
But just because I think the Gannon scandal is not important does not mean that I think it is completely unworthy of attention. On the contrary, I believe that the precedents that are being set will have repercussions long after the names of Jeff Gannon/James Guckert are long forgotten. Many lefty bloggers, for instance, are sowing the seeds of their own destruction, allowing the public to see how they embrace bizarre conspiracy theories and how they gleefully destroy homosexuals who dare to disagree with the gay-rights agenda. By exposing themselves as lunatics and homophobes, though, they are making it easier for the MSM to dismiss all bloggers as untrustworthy. This should be a concern for everyone who is concered about the future of this medium.
Because that damage is still being done, analyzing that angle will have to wait for a future post. And while I don't have anything particularly noteworthy to say about the Gannon scandal, I will share my thoughts for those who asked:
--The attacks on Gannon began after he asked a "softball" question at a White House press briefing. Are Gannon's critics implying that freedom of the press is only to be used to ask hard questions that are critical of the Administration?
--Does anyone else find it ironic that pseudonymous bloggers like “Atrios” and “Mumon” criticize Gannon/Guckert for using a pseudonym?
--Why is it illegitimate for a journalist to use an alias to protect his own identity yet it’s considered a standard and acceptable practice for reporters to quote anonymous sources?
--If advertising one’s services as a “gay escort” is de facto evidence of prostitution, why are such services allowed to be advertised in phone books and newspapers?
--Let’s assume for the sake of argument that Gannon was involved in prostitution. Would Gannon and his “john” be equally culpable? In other words, is it worse to be the one getting paid for the services than to be the one doing the paying? If Gannon is disqualified from being a reporter for having been involved in prostitution should any journalist that has ever solicited a prostitute also be banned from the White House briefing room?
--Many people have said that the person who was in charge of issuing day passes for the White House briefing should be fired. But what did this person do wrong? The only evidence that was presented that Gannon was a gay escort is from Paul Leddy, the designer of the escort site, who claims to have recognized the photos of Gannon and made the connection only after the story broke. Assuming that Leddy is telling the truth, how could anyone in the White House press office found this information during a routine background check?
--Would bloggers who believe that it’s legitimate to investigate Gannon's personal life be willing to undergo the same scrutiny? If not, why do they consider themselves exempt? And if they are willing, would they be willing to post their real names and a photo of themselves in order that anyone with dirt on them might be able to come forward and share it with the rest of the world?
--“Does my past mean I can't have a future?” Gannon asked in a recent interview, “Does it disqualify me from being a journalist?" Those are both excellent questions that deserve to be answered by everyone who forms an opinion on this story. To the first I would say that a person’s past behavior should not be the sole criterion for which they should be judged. People have the capability to change and so should be allowed a chance to prove that they have renounced shameful behavior. To deny them an opportunity for true repentance is to reject an essential component of their humanity.
But the value of journalism in a free society is dependent on individual integrity, a trait that requires wholeness of character. Humans cannot truly compartmentalize their life into various spheres in which honesty and dishonesty are kept seperate and distinct. A man who would break the sacred oath of marriage by cheating on his wife is unlikely to be trustworthy in lesser contractual obligations.
In the past I’ve argued that Alfred Kinsey’s work should be judged in light of his sadomasochistic and deviant sexual practices and that Dr. C.A. Tripp’s fascination with masturbating dogs should be factored into his claims of Lincoln’s homosexuality. If it is true that Gannon was a gay prostitute during the time he worked as a reporter covering the White House, that behavior would taint his work even more than his open pro-GOP bias.
Unless you stray into the left wing side of the blogosphere, you probably haven’t heard the strange story of Talon News reporter Jeff Gannon. (Salon.com has a good rundown on the semi-sordid details.) I’ll leave it to the lefties to bash Gannon for possibly being the owner of some gay p*rn websites. And I won’t bother to point out the irony in how people are bashing Talon for being a “fake news” service while every politician in America makes a mandatory appearance on a “fake news” cable TV show.
What I will comment on (and relish with smug satisfaction) is the way the MSM is whining and complaining that a representative from a hack news service was treated as an equal among the “legitimate White House press corps.” Now, I’m not going to defend Talon News because I’m sure there are hundreds of other worthy outlets more deserving of the honor. But I do want to know why these White House correspondents think they are so special. Asking questions at a press conference isn’t exactly brain surgery.
And why are they just now whining about politically motivated scribes posing as journalists? Was there ever in the entire history of the Washington press corps a more worthless hack than Helen Thomas? Did anyone in the Press Corps ever suggest that she didn't belong?
The White House press corps shouldn't be a caste system. Each area of the the media, including blogs and small web publications, should be alloted space that they would share with their counterparts. Each niche would have a seat on a rotating basis (CNN sharing with Fox News, DailyKos sharing with Powerline) and a full bio of each “journalist” would be made available on a Press Corps website so that we can know who is asking the question. Whether a reporter works for ABC News or the Boston Globe doesn't mean they are automatically worthy of our trust. Institutional credibility died a painfully public death at the hands of Dan Rather.
The MSM is still relevant, still important, and still dominant. But the media oligarchy needs to be more inclusive. Just because a billionaire (i.e., Ted Turner, Rupert Murdock) has the cash to start a cable news service doesn’t mean he should automatically get a seat at the White House table. After all, the White House belongs to the people. We paid for the chairs in the Briefing Room; we should have a say in who gets to sit in them.
The biggest surprise provided by the release of the RatherGate report was not what was found in the investigation's findings but with the muted reaction within the blogosphere. Is the 234 page report simply more than most bloggers are willing to tackle? Is the apathy due to post-election fatigue? Or is that many bloggers simply didn’t know what they wanted from the report?
One blogger who certainly did know what he wanted to hear was Hugh Hewitt, who expected a resolution of what he considers the “central question”: whether a political agenda played any role in the airing of the Segment. And the answer? “The Panel does not find a basis to accuse those who investigated, produced, vetted or aired the Segment of having a political bias.” Hugh responds:
CBS got what it wanted --a slap on the wrist, an apparent wrap-up with the dismissal of some underlings. The culture of undisclosed bias gets a pass, and the obvious corruption of the "news" process in the service of the Democratic Party is classified as "unknowable" because Dan Rather and Mary Mapes said they weren't partisans? What a joke, as transparent a whitewash as the documents were forgeries.
Although we didn’t need a former attorney general to tell us that there was a political bias guiding the process, such an admission might have helped salvage the credibility of CBS News. Instead, the report provided an even more disturbing question: How do we know this hasn’t happened before?
The Panel gives us reason to wonder whether this was an aberration or evidence of larger credibility problems within the network’s news department:
The Panel find that the vetting process for the September 8 Segment was seriously flawed. The Panel believes that this was caused in large part by the speed with which this Segment was produced. The Panel also believes that the vetting process was not sufficient because too much deference was given to Mapes because of her experience and much admired history at CBS News and 60 Minutes Wednesday, as well as her association with Rather. Rather does not appear to have participated in any of the vetting sessions or to have even seen the Segment before it was aired. (p.14)
[snip]
The Panel concludes that the September 8 Segment reflects a widespread breakdown of fundamental processes at 60 Minutes Wednesday. CBS News has an historic and deep-seated commitment to accuracy and fairness that CBS News has articulated. That makes it all the more difficult for the Panel to understand how this breakdown could have occurred.
While the Panel was not asked to look at any other segments of 60 Minutes Wednesday, it did not find any evidence that the flaws of the September 8 Segment carried over to any other segment. More than a few of the staff members interviewed by the Panel likened this breakdown in the production of the September 8 Segment to a “perfect storm,” in which a confluence of factors came together and led to the failures. The Panel believes that there is some basis for this analogy as the combination of a new 60 Minutes Wednesday management team, great deference given to a highly respected producer and the network’s news anchor, competitive pressures, and a zealous belief in the truth of the Segment seem to have led many to disregard some fundamental journalistic principles, including but not limited to: [snip] (pg. 29)
Let’s look at the elements that went into the creation of this “perfect storm”:
1. The speed with which the story was produced.
2. The deference given to an experienced producer.
3. The producer’s association with Dan Rather.
4. A belief in the truth of the subject matter.
Is the Panel claiming that this “confluence of factors” is a rare event? Are we expected to believe that most stories are produced at a leisurely pace with an inexperienced producer that has no association with Rather and who doesn’t believe in the veracity of the material? Do they think we are that gullible?
Maybe they think that we are supposed to be as swayed by CBS News’ “historic and deep-seated commitment to accuracy and fairness” as they were. After all, they were able, without even bothering to look at past production efforts, to determine that there is not “any evidence that the flaws of the September 8 Segment carried over to any other segment.”
Are we truly to believe that the only time this “perfect storm” occurred just happened to coincide with the blogosphere catching the flaws in the story? If so then that speaks volumes – more so than the 234 page report – about what went wrong at CBS News.
Related:
Earlier this week a photojournalist from the Associated Press took a series of pictures in which “three pistol-wielding gunmen” executed several election workers on a busy street in Baghdad:
In the dramatic photo sequence one of the captives is shown lying prone on the pavement, while the another one seems to be kneeling as the armed men approach, casually carrying their handguns or aiming them at the men.
Both of the victims shown in the sequence wore the traditional Arab headscarfs. In contrast, the attackers were bareheaded and apparently unafraid to show their faces.
Pseudonymous blogger “Wretchard” of The Belmont Club ponders the possibility that the reporter may have had advance knowledge of the attack:
Even with today's proliferation of compact photographic equipment, a legitimate photojournalist rarely gets the opportunity to capture an execution….It may have been pure luck, but it was surely the longest of odds that would have brought an Associated Press cameraman to the site of a surprise attack on two Iraqi electoral workers.
[snip] Press reports highlight the confidence and boldness of the insurgents. "Both of the victims shown in the sequence wore traditional Arab headscarfs. In contrast, the attackers were bareheaded and apparently unafraid to show their faces", suggesting that 'collaborators' must conceal their faces while the Ba'athists stride with impunity through the light of day. It was fortunate for the AP that their photographer was accidentally there.
Wretchards implication that it might not have been an “accident” has infuriated Mark Follman, associate news editor at Salon.com:
This is hardly the first time that pundits on the political right have sought to portray a left-wing media insurgency bent on capturing grim images in U.S.-occupied Iraq in order to undermine the Bush administration. Last April, the editors of the New York Post blared accusations of the AP cutting a deal with Fallujah's mutilators and helping to maximize the carnage of the four American military contractors murdered there.
Reporting from the most perilous sectors of a war zone is a complicated business, both in terms of access and safety. The kind of flimsy commentary-with-an-agenda bouncing around the conservative blogosphere right now regarding an AP insurgency against the war effort is not only a disservice to the public but a dishonor to the many journalists who have been injured or killed carrying out their dangerous mission in Iraq.
Like the always level-headed Roger Simon, I’m inclined to give the reporter the benefit of the doubt. But I also agree with Simon that the AP owes us an explanation. A strain of moral relativism has long been a pervasive feature of media ethics so it is not, as Follman claims, a "dishonor" to reporters to raise the question of complicity.
Take, for example, the 1989 PBS panel discussion on “Ethics in America.” The moderator presented a hypothetical question to 60 Minutes correspondent Mike Wallace: what would a TV reporter do if he learned the enemy troops with which he was traveling were about to launch a surprise attack on an American unit?
Wallace said he "would regard it simply as another story that they are there to cover" and was bewildered when Peter Jennings claimed he would warn the Americans. “I'm a little bit of a loss to understand why, because you are an American, you would not have covered that story," said the CBS correspondent.
The moderator, Harvard professor Charles Ogletree Jr, asked, “Don't you have a higher duty as an American citizen to do all you can to save the lives of soldiers rather than this journalistic ethic of reporting fact?" Without hesitating, Wallace responded: "No, you don't have higher duty... you're a reporter." (This convinced Jennings, who conceded, "I think he's right too, I chickened out.")
When panel member Brent Scowcroft pointed out that "you're Americans first, and you're journalists second", Wallace was taken aback. "What in the world is wrong,” he asked, “with photographing this attack …on American soldiers?"
Mike Wallace’s belief that journalists don’t have a “higher duty” to prevent the slaughter of Americans is chilling. If Wallace's maxim were taken as a guiding principle, the effects on journalism would be devastating. There is a insurmountable moral gulf between "reporting facts" about civilian deaths after they occur and having prior knowledge that the killing is imminent. The first is an example of reporting the facts; the second, a example of abetting murder.
Unfortunately, when a veteran reporter like Wallace admits that he would not prevent an ambush on American soldiers, then we have to assume that it’s possible that an AP reporter would not prevent an ambush on Iraqi civilians. Still, I would hope that most reporters are, to paraphrase Mr. Scowcroft, “humans first, journalists second.” Hopefully, not every reporter adheres to Wallace’s maxim.
Related:
Hugh Hewitt adds:
Speaking of The Belmont Club, Wretchard asks the hard questions about an AP photographer's complicity in the execution of three Iraqi poll workers. Salon is shocked by the questions, but AP should answer with specifics about the circumstances surrounding the photo. The Vietnamization of Iraqi reporting obliges us to wonder whether this and future photos are being staged for the benefit of the American audience. There may not be a Giap running around Baghdad, but it wouldn't take a genius to figure out how to marry the aims of the insurgency to the palpable anti-Bush feelings among a large slice of American MSM.
In 1856, murmurs of rebellion against the French colonial rule began to spread throughout Algeria. A group of Muslim holy men known as marabouts were able to stir dissent and gain prominence by convincing the local populations that they possessed supernatural powers. The amazing feats of these “god-like” men allowed them to gain considerable influence, which the religious faction planned to use to overthrow their European rulers.
Realizing that something must be done but not wanting to commit more of his exhausted troops to the North African colony, Napoleon III and his Arab Bureau conceived a quirky plan involving “The Father of Modern Magic”, Jean Eugene Robert-Houdin. The conjurer was called out of retirement and sent to Algeria to provide a command performance before a gathering of superstitious Arab chieftains. Setting up in a theater in the capital city of Algiers, the French magician performed astounding stunts – catching a bullet being fired by an audience member, making a young Arab disappear, and with the ingenious use of an electromagnet, stripping the strength of a muscular man who was unable to lift a metal box.
The crowds, certain that they were in the presence of Satan, grew fearful of the French sorcerer. But then Robert-Houdin broke the magician’s cardinal rule: he sent out translators to explain how the tricks were done. The stunned Arabs realized that they had been duped, not only by the Frenchman but by the marabouts. The holy men lost credibility and the revolution was averted.
Throughout history cultural elites like the marabouts have been able to secure their influence by controlling knowledge that is not available to the “common man.” In America that influence has, at least for the past forty years, been wielded by the mainstream media. But the advent of the Internet -- and the blogosphere in particular -- has stripped away the façade that the media possesses specialized information that is unavailable to the masses.
While Dan Rather and the forged memo provided the year’s most significant example of the blogosphere’s power to question the media’s authority, other smaller exposes are constantly heading to the fore. Hugh Hewitt, for example, has been shining a spotlight on a Newsweek article on the birth of Christ. While newsweeklies often use cover stories on God and religion in order to spark sales (in 2003, The Economist's best cover featured the Virgin Mary and Newsweek's best was on "Bush and God”), their coverage is often embarrassingly misguided:
I am not sure into which category Newsweek's hugely silly cover story on Christmas should fall, but that it is a hugely silly, flawed and misleading story cannot be doubted. It is sort of the religion story equivalent of Rathergate, compete with biased experts and a purposefully blinkered reporter.
Start with the piece itself, authored by Jon Meacham. Understand from the start that Meacham isn't a theologian, or a historian. He has a BA from the University of the South, has written a book, belongs to the right clubs in NYC, and that's it. No scholarly credentials, no background in religious studies, just a scribbler. In an area of great controversy and vast learning, such a journalist is at great risk of misunderstanding the lay of the land, or of understanding it, but refusing to report it because to do so would make a cover story less interesting.
The primary problem with Meacham’s article isn’t that it’s unashamedly biased (though it certainly is that) nor even that he “doesn’t know what he doesn’t know.” No, the fatal flaw is in Meacham’s assumption that we don’t know what he doesn’t know. Like many others in the media, Meacham simply believes that he knows more than his audience. Epistemic humility, however, is an essential attribute for all journalists who work and live in what my friend John Coleman calls, “the world of people much smarter than me.”
This is not to say that Meacham (or journalists in general) are not intelligent people. The Newsweek editor appears to be extremely talented and accomplished. But like his colleague Dan Rather, Meacham errs in assuming that his institution’s credibility and prestige imbues him with some form of singular knowledge and insight. His pedantic approach to the nativity story, though, only makes him appear, as Hewitt notes, “hugely silly.”
Biblical scholars such as Mark Roberts and Al Mohler have not only revealed Meacham’s naïve understanding of the material but have done so with remarkable speed. Though the story appears in the December 13th issue, it has already been dissected and scrutinized by dozens, perhaps hundreds, of bloggers. The newsweeklies can hardly get their biased pieces onto newsstands nowadays before they're discredited.
Like the Algerian marabouts, the mainstream media is only able to retain their influence by convincing the populace they possess special skill and knowledge. But as the Internet continues to fills with Robert-Houdin-type debunkers, the media continues to lose credibility, influence, and power. By revealing the secrets of the Arab cultural elite the French magician was able to defuse a revolution. By revealing the secrets of the American media elite, though, the blogosphere may just able to start one.
Related:
Now that the two media behemoths Clear Channel and Infinity Broadcasting own every FCC license in the Western Hemisphere, commercial radio has consolidated into one monolithic blanket of banality . Even those of us who are fortunate enough to live in a major radio market (I live in Dallas/Ft.Worth) have few real choices on our radio dials.
Pop and country stations used to play the “top 40” but now they repeat the same singles over and over throughout the day. No matter when I tune in I know I'll hear about Usher’s confessions or how Toby Keith loves his bar. The music from both genres has become so monotonous that I’m starting to get them mixed up in my head. Just the other day I imagined that Nelly and Tim McGraw were singing a duet.
There is also the “alternative” station in town which has a heavy rotation of Nickelback and Green Day. Apparently, the term “alternative” is loosely defined as to mean any alternative to Usher and Toby Keith. We do have a true alternative at the university, but like every campus radio station the signal can’t reach past the beer-soaked lawns on fraternity row.
We also have an “urban” channel that plays hardcore rap in case you need a soundtrack for a drive-by shooting and a “smooth jazz” station that will make you want to reach for your gat and bust a cap in somebody. There is one exceptional “classic soul” channel that is worthy of praise. Unfortunately, during the morning drive-time the music is replaced by Tom Joyner and company giggling for five seconds before going to the next commercial. And of course you have the requisite “Christian” station playing sugary music so vapid and mawkish that the playlist must be programmed by Satan himself.
Fortunately, I still have another option available. There’s a place on my radio dial that I can turn to hear news, current events, intelligent conversation, and the latest on politics and culture; an oasis amidst the desert of the airwaves. And no, it’s not talk radio. It’s better. It’s NPR.
Here’s six reasons why National Public Radio beats talk radio:
It’s not part of the conservative monoculture – Here in the Metroplex I have three different AM talk stations to choose from. During the day I can listen to Mark Davis, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Gary McNamara, Darrell Ankarlo, Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, Greg Knapp, Tony Snow, Laura Ingraham, Dennis Prager, Michael Medved, and Michael Savage.* Every single host is a middle-aged white male conservative (except for Ingraham, who merely imitates being one).
Naturally, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that perspective. But why would I want to listen to the same viewpoint being expressed ad nauseum? Seriously, if I want to know what a white male conservative thinks I can just read my own blog.
*There is also Bill Bennett (8am-11am) and Hugh Hewitt (8pm-11pm) but I can’t pick up either one of those shows on my car stereo.
There are no callers – On her recent appearance on Sean Hannity’s radio show, Jeanne Garofalo refused to talk to callers. She claimed that when people call in to radio shows it does nothing but bore the audience. For once, Jeanne and I agree. The people who call radio shows rarely have anything interesting to say. Mostly they simply want to express that they either love the show’s host or tell them that they disagree with him (and it’s almost always a him). The opinions expressed by callers are consistently unoriginal and dull. Only on the most rare occasion do the add anything worthwhile to the conversation.
But radio hosts love them because they fill airtime. Because the supply always exceeds the demand, a national radio host can fill any excess time by simply answering the phones. Even the most obscure topic will keep people waiting on the line for hours just so that they can hear themselves talk.
NPR shows, on the other hand, rarely have callers. Instead they fill the spare airtime with actual content.
No commercials – I realize that radio is a business and that stations have to sell commercials to stay on the air. But do they need to have so many? Most shows have news and traffic at the top and bottom of each hour. That’s two breaks, along with local commercials. Then they run ads about every 5-7 minutes. All together, the show is interrupted about ten times every hour. Chance are that when you get into your car and turn on radio the AM station will either be playing an ad or will be going to commercial within thirty seconds. Add these breaks to the time wasted on callers and you end up with very little actual content.
No Dittoheads – In all of the years I’ve listened to NPR, I’ve never heard anyone praise Terry Gross or Bob Edwards. Yet you can’t listen to talk radio for more than five minutes without hearing a caller sucking up to the host. I’m sure it is very gratifying to hear people constantly sing your praises but it's annoying for the listener.
And while I’m sure that Sean Hannity is a decent guy and good citizen, it’s rather disturbing hearing him constantly referred to as a “Great Man.” Smedley Butler, a Marine who won two Medals of Honor, was a great man. George Washington, the man who helped win the American Revolution, was a great man. Abraham Lincoln, a President who held the country together during the Civil War, was a great man. Sean Hannity is a talk show host. He makes his living talking. All day. That doesn’t quite qualify him for Great Man status.
It's not Rush – Let’s admit the truth: Rush’s glory days have long since passed him by. Fifteen years ago his schtick was still somewhat fresh and daring. Yes, he was egotistical and overbearing but it was all for show; a way to get under the skin of liberals. But now it’s simply become tiresome. Anyone who still listens to Rush drone on for three hours (or fifteen minutes once you cut out the commercials) is likely doing so out of nostalgia.
Rush was a pioneer and there is no doubt that if it weren’t for him conservative talk radio wouldn’t be the force it is today. But, ironically, his success has led to his downfall. Nowadays he’s being upstaged by imitators like Sean Hannity who do a better job of playing “Rush” than Limbaugh does. It’s time for Mr. Snerdley to whisper in the big guy’s headphones and tell him to put away the Golden Microphone.
There's no Dr. Laura – Say what you will about NPR, it has no one as annoying as Dr. Laura. Listening to her tell people how they could fix their lives is like being trapped in a small room with your mother-in-law.
In comparison, the flaws of talk radio allow NPR to stand out more than is warranted. Listening to NPR is like dating a charming and beautiful woman that has a semi-serious personality disorder; you're enchanted by her yet know you can’t commit to someone so troubled. But most criticism of the station is too simplistic, too concerned with its liberal bias. The problem with the station, though, runs much deeper than a mere penchant for left-leaning politics. NPR can be heard in almost every town in the country yet its worldview is a secular cosmopolitanism that is foreign to many Americans, particularly those in non-urban areas or in the “Red States.” The hosts of All Things Considered, for example, would have no trouble relating to an obscure avant garde musician, while a popular gospel singer would be considered an anthropological curiosity.
Still, NPR takes ideas, culture, art, and international affairs seriously. Conservative talk radio may touch on the same issues but generally they are either treated defensively (“In our next segment, the NEA's plan to ruin our children…”) or as purely political concerns (“Will the genocide in Darfur hurt Kofi Annan?”). Talk radio is merely topical while NPR attempts to be timely.
Mostly when I listen to NPR I wonder why conservatives can’t produce something similar. Why can’t we have discussions about art for art’s sake on the radio? Why can’t we have debates about the role of religion without it being subordinated to politics? Why have we ceded all culture to the “liberals?”
The other day I heard a segment on NPR by a young medical student at Harvard. He was describing a scene in which a pediatrician convinced a child to endure the pain of a vaccination by invoking “magic dust.” From this launching point he raised questions about the ethics of the placebo effect and the trust we put in physicians. It didn’t produce any earth-shaking epiphanies but it did make me ponder the questions involved. Like the best blog posts, it helped me to think about an issue that wasn’t imperative but was still important.
The short segment reminded me of what radio could be, but rarely becomes. Too often talk radio simply asks us to choose sides. Issues aren’t debated in order to change minds, for our minds are already made up. We are only asked to agree or disagree with the host. I, for one, don’t want my time wasted on such trivial discussions. I want to be challenged, I want a real, honest debate. Maybe Rush is right about everything. But I’d still prefer to think for myself.
When I was a younger I used to love hanging around the barracks watching cheesy war movies with my fellow Marines. We would cringe and howl at seeing actors with sideburns and hair down to their collar pretend they were part of our beloved Corps. The lower the movie's budget the lower our expectations became. The sloppy salutes, the wrong uniforms, the use of Army terminology would have us rolling our eyes, wondering how Hollywood could be so clueless. Couldn’t the producers just find a Marine and ask them how someone in the Corps would talk, dress, and act?
Nowadays I get a similar feeling when the media talks about evangelicals. Apparently, the religious species Americanus evangelicus is a rare and elusive bird. How else can we explain that no one in the media has ever actually seen one?
Take, for example, one of my favorite liberal whipping-boys, Timothy Noah of Slate.com. In his latest column he explains to the educated masses, “Why you can't call them "the Christian right”:
Conservatives like to chortle about the ever-changing nomenclature for hypersensitive groups within the Democratic coalition. It's not Negro, it's black. No, it's not black, it's Black. No, it's not Black, it's African-American. It's not crippled, it's handicapped. No, it's not handicapped, it's physically challenged. It's not Hispanic, it's Latino. And so on. Those politically correct left-liberals! They're so busy thinking up new names for themselves that they don't have time to win elections!
But on Election Night last week, I discovered that sometime when I wasn't paying attention it had become an insult to call somebody a member of "the Christian right."
[snip]
It turns out that the Christian right has been renaming itself with a frequency that would make Jesse Jackson blush. In the late 1970s, it was the "religious right." Jerry Falwell favored that term, and the media picked it up. Pretty soon, though, members of the movement perceived that the label had, for some mysterious reason, become pejorative, so the "religious right" was renamed the "Christian right."
Someone should get Noah a calendar; he's apparantly confusing 2004 with 1979. Obviously he didn't get the memo that that the Pope is more popular among evangelicals than Jerry Falwell. The idea that Falwell is representative of Christian conservaties is a outdated as, well, as thinking that Jesse Jackson is a leader of the “black community.”
It should also be noted that the reason Falwell preferred the phrase “religious right” is because his group, the Moral Majority, was composed of Christians, Jews, Mormons, Muslims and other politically conservative religious groups.
Now the movement is shedding "Christian right," because that term, mysteriously, has become pejorative, too. The new favored term is "the pro-family movement," but that's so overtly propagandistic—secularists are anti-family?—that it hasn't gotten much pickup. Hence "conservative Christian" or "evangelical Christian."
The pro-family movement? That’s a new one on me. And the reason we “shed” the label “Christian right” is because it isn’t accurate. An evangelical Christian doesn’t have to be a member of the “right” to be opposed to such issues as abortion and same-sex marriage. They just have to be an evangelical Christian.
The trouble with "conservative Christian" is that it confuses the question of whether an individual is conservative in his religious practice with the question of whether that person is conservative politically. (Much of the black church, for example, is conservative in the religious but not the political sense.)
No, the trouble is in assuming that a person can be a “conservative Christian” and still support “liberal” ideas such as abortion and gay marriage.
Similarly, there are politically liberal "evangelical Christians," and there used to be quite a lot more of them. (In Elisabeth Sifton's book The Serenity Prayer, a memoir of her father, the politically liberal theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, Sifton points out that Niebuhr was an evangelical Protestant.)
Niebuhr an “evangelical?” Perhaps in the sense that “evangelical” can be a synonym for Lutheran. But the label of “politically liberal evangelical Christian” does not apply to Niebuhr in the same way as it does someone like Jim Wallis. Theologian Stanley Hauerwas even questioned whether Niebuhr was even a Christian much less an evangelical.
Even fundamentalists (an evangelical subgroup whom Jennings, incidentally, conflated with the broader Christian right) have some political liberals among them.
I can’t imagine a more oxmoronic label than “politically liberal fundamentalist.” Show me a fundie who supports gay rights and abortion on demand and I’ll show you someone unclear on the concept of what it means to be a “fundamentalist.”
In ditching the term, "Christian right," Green summed up, the Christian right chose to associate itself with the pool of Christians from which it hopes to draw, not the folks who already belong. That's the good news for liberals. The bad news is that according to exit polls, the large pool of "evangelical/born-again," which represents 23 percent of those who voted for president, went 78 percent for Bush. So maybe these distinctions are starting to break down. Even if they do, I don't see why we can't call these folks "the Christian right."
I say we make a deal. Noah can keep calling us “the Christian right” if we can continue to refer to him as a “hopelessly clueless liberal.”
Have an example of the media misrepresenting evangelicals? Send it to me at jpcarter[at]evangelicaloutpost.com.
Josh Micah Marshall finally breaks a Big Story. After reading after reading the following entry in an article on the Fox News website he asks “Is Fox News literally making stuff up out of whole cloth about John Kerry?”:
Rallying supporters in Tampa Friday, Kerry played up his performance in Thursday night's debate, in which many observers agreed the Massachusetts senator outperformed the president.
"Didn't my nails and cuticles look great? What a good debate!" Kerry said Friday.
With the foreign-policy debate in the history books, Kerry hopes to keep the pressure on and the sense of traction going.
Aides say he will step up attacks on the president in the next few days, and pivot somewhat to the domestic agenda, with a focus on women and abortion rights.
"It's about the Supreme Court. Women should like me! I do manicures," Kerry said.
Kerry still trails in actual horse-race polls, but aides say his performance was strong enough to rally his base and further appeal to voters ready for a change.
"I'm metrosexual — he's a cowboy," the Democratic candidate said of himself and his opponent.
A "metrosexual" is defined as an urbane male with a strong aesthetic sense who spends a great deal of time and money on his appearance and lifestyle.
I give Marshall his due credit for catching that one. There's nothing in that story that would have made me think for a second that it wasn’t true. Fox News apologized, though, and claimed that “the item was based on a reporter’s partial script that had been written in jest and should not have been posted or broadcast.” What they should have said was that this is a case of a "thick partisan fogging machine [that] seeks to cloud the core truth of our story by raising questions about the messenger, methods and techniques." After all, the documents may be false but it doesn't change the core truth -- that John Kerry's a metrosexual.*
(Hat tip: Tgirsh from Lean Left)
*That reminds me of a question I’ve been wondering about. How did Kerry’s tan wash off fade in time for the debate?
One story is about Bush; the other about Kerry. One was broken by New Media maverick Matt Drudge; the other by a venerable wire service, the Associated Press. Both stories have garnered widespread attention; neither is of any substantive importance. But while the stories don’t tell us anything about the candidates involved, they do reveal the differences between the mainstream press and the new forms of media.
Yesterday Drudge reported that in preparation for the upcoming debates, Democratic candidate John Kerry has turned a “rich pumpkin-colored hue.” Although the transformation from pale to tan was attributed to the “late September Wisconsin sun” most everyone recognizes that the strange color could only have come from a chemical tanner. Bloggers and talk radio hosts have been relentlessly mocking the Senator over his new look, even gleefully dubbing it Oompa LoompaGate after the similarly shaded creatures from the 1971 children’s film, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
The other, more staid story, is the Associated Press’ coverage of a standard political endorsement made by The Lone Star Iconoclast, the local newspaper of President Bush’s adopted hometown of Crawford, TX. In a recent editorial, the publisher of the Iconoclast endorsed Kerry for the presidency saying the Massachusetts senator will “restore American dignity.” What the AP doesn’t mention is that the publisher also happens to be the Democratic mayor of nearby Clinton, TX. An endorsement by a small-town Democratic mayor who owns a newspaper with fewer readers than the average blog (weekly circulation of 425) isn’t exactly newsworthy. But the mainstream media views it as ironic (at least in an Alanis Morissette kind of way).
Of course it is no more ironic than it is newsworthy for a Democratic politician to endorse another Democratic politician, which is why the AP had to leave out that small detail. The omission allowed them to portray the nonevent as a small example that highlights their version of a Big Truth: even the people in Crawford don’t support the President.
The problem for the mainstream media is that they are unable to control the story. Anyone with access to Google can find the details they omitted, ruining a good metaphor and effectively deflating the story. What was trivial but amusing becomes simply pointless.
In contrast, the Kerry story remains trivial but expands as the addition of outside details are added. The fact that Kerry is an odd shade of orange is peculiar but not particularly interesting. Even attempting to add a strained metaphor (the tan veneer is like the veneer of Kerry’s character…) doesn’t add enough to make it worthy of notice. The transformation from a non-story to a meme was only able to occur because of the allusion to the Oompa Loompas. In the post-Seinfeld age, even nothingness can be alchemically transformed by it association with pop culture.
The mainstream media, of course, believes it would be gauche to even ask Kerry if he had a store-bought tan, much less draw a comparison to the wee, wise candy workers. Even though they know the tan was applied from a bottle, they know that we know, and they know they Kerry knows that we all know, they can’t bring themselves to point that out. In that respect, our mainstream American media is very British.
The stiff-upper lip approach helps explains why a young turk like Ali G can dupe a veteran newsman like Sam Donaldson. Ali G (nee Baron Cohen) is able to exploit the self-serious nature of the media interview for comic effect. It’s also the reason The Daily Show with Jon Stewart is a more influential news venue than 60 Minutes. Stewart's irreverent approach allows him to deliver news product with a dash of irony and a smidgen of pop references thrown in for flavor. And, like most others who work in the New Media, Stewart recognizes that his audience is smart enough to be let in on the joke. After all, everyone knows that politics is absurd. The mainstream media just tries to ignore that fact.
Dan Rather must be a glutton for punishment.
Not two week after Rathergate, his news department puts out another story based upon phony documents and sources with hidden agendas. This time he falls for the nonsense about the reinstatement of the draft (click for video):
“It's no secret: The all- volunteer U.S. Military, especially the Army, Marines and many reserve units, are stretched thin in Iraq and Afghanistan,” says Rather in the opening of the segment. “So what about bringing back the draft?”
The story mentions the draft scare emails that have been circulating but never mentions that they’ve been debunked as hoaxes. CBS reporter Richard Schlesinger also uses Beverly Cocco for the centerpiece of the story. Cocco is a Philadelphia woman who says she is "sick to my stomach" that her two college age sons might be drafted.
SCHLESINGER (voiceover): But Beverly's not buying it. She's a Republican, but she's also a single issue voter.
(on-camera) Would you vote for a Democrat?
COCCO: Absolutely. I would vote for Howdie Doody if I thought it would keep my boys home and safe.
SCHLESINGER (voiceover): In fact, there are at least three votes in this house riding on the draft: Beverly's and her sons,' Carmen [sic] and Nick.
(on-camera) Are you guys worried about being drafted?
NICK COCCO (College senior): Yeah. It's the talk. The talk's there. Though people aren't actually coming out and saying it, it's, it's there.
What Schlesinger fails to point out is that Mrs. Cocco isn’t just a concerned mom. She’s also the chapter president of an advocacy group called People Against the Draft (PAD). The group, though, doesn’t just take a stand against conscription. According to their “Resolution” they also “call for an end to the war in Iraq and an end to US wars of aggression.”
According to RatherBiased, the group's domain is registered to a man named Jacob Levich, a left-wing activist who in a 2001 essay compared the Bush Administration to the totalitarian government portrayed in George Orwell's 1984.
They also not that PAD lists Anita Dutt, a Green Party activist who is also a member of an anti-war group called Bronx Action for Justice and Peace. In a March 3, 2003 New York Times profile of the group reprinted on the organization's web site, Heidi Hynes, one of its leaders, said of her fellow members that "none of us are Republicans."
Not surprisingly, the CBS story also failed to point out that there are two bills in Congress that are seeking to reestablish the draft, both of which (S-89 and HR-163) are sponsored exclusively by Democrats. The Republican leadership has made it clear that the bills will never make it out of the Congress.
When the forgery story was being scrutinized, Dan Rather claimed, "If the documents are not what we were led to believe, I'd like to break that story.” He missed his chance on that one but he still has an opportunity to find who stole CBS News’ credibility. That’s a scoop just waiting for a veteran newsman like Rather.
Looking to end recurring speculation that their partnership is on the rocks, executives from CBS News and the Democratic National Committee said the two organizations remain committed to CBS-DNC, the news channel they launched for the election of 2004.
"It's just not true," Andrew Heyward, president of CBS News, said of the rumors that the joint venture is in trouble. Joe Lockhart, a top aide to John Kerry, added that "the state of the relationship is very healthy, and from the DNC side we're pleased with the way things are going."
The two executives, who seldom speak publicly about the partnership, said they felt the need to because the rumors were hurting morale at CBS-DNC.
The doubts over the DNC’s commitment to CBS first heated up three days ago when John Kerry questioned the wisdom of getting involved in the network news business. After a speech in New York, Sen. Kerry said if the company could make the decision to partner with Dan Rather again, "I think we should have stuck with Chris Matthews."
(With apologies to Joe Flint and The Wall Street Journal.)
So you think your know the Killian memo controversy. You followed Powerline’s post before it was picked up by Drudge. You viewed LGF’s recreation of the memo in MS Word and followed Kos’ attempt to discredit the match. You know the arguments over the superscript, the kerning, the proportional spacing. You now know more about 70’s era Selectric typewriters than you do about your own computer. You follow Hugh and Glenn for the latest updates; you’ve bookmarked RatherGate. You think you know just about everything there is to know about this story, don’t you?
But do you know what the memo actually says?
Of course, you know what it’s about. You might have even read it once, though you likely can't recall any of the actual content. If pressed you could give a vague summary that is based more on what you have read from other people than from the actual copy of the memo itself. But for all the controversy, intrigue, and interest, you probably don’t really even know what the memo says, do you?
No. But that’s okay. Because the memo isn’t about the message. The memo is the message.
I realize that cribbing from Marshall McCluhan went out of fashion before I was out of diapers. But the Canadian professor’s overused clichés are looking more and more prophetic:
Each medium, independent of the content it mediates, has its own intrinsic effects which are its unique message.
The message of any medium or technology is the change of
